Reviews tagging 'Bullying'

A Man Called Ove by Fredrik Backman

16 reviews

abominablesnowaro's review against another edition

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funny hopeful sad medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

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james1star's review against another edition

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emotional funny reflective sad medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.75

Agh this book was something. Quick plotline is we follow Ove who is ‘grumpy old man’ who has decided to die after loosing his wife and job but then things put a halt to his plans and Yhh that’s all I’ll say as I don’t want to ruin anything for readers. 

It was so good!! Oh my goodness!! I absolutely loved this story - it was so emotive, sad, happy, sweet, tender, annoying, tense, lovely and just everything. Perfect character analysis which is followed throughout where we start not really liking Ove but as every paragraph goes on you fall in love with him, such a turnaround. And the plethora of side characters are so diverse, lovable, real and have in depth characters analyses too. My favourite character would 100% be Sonja, no doubt about it (unintentional ABBA reference) who was just pure loveliness, the sweetest, most caring and amazing woman with such a positive attitude, wow!! Ove is certainly problematic at points but this just makes him so real and Yhh everything in terms of plot and character studyness was exceptional. 

My only qualm and why I dropped it slightly below the full 5 stars is I didn’t exactly love the writing style, I personally felt there was far too much repetition of names (Ove is written at least every 5 lines on every page for example) and other things, topics and the like but it definitely readable and enjoyable but only a slight issue. 
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chris_reads's review against another edition

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emotional funny hopeful reflective sad slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

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michieldecock_'s review against another edition

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emotional funny hopeful reflective sad tense medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

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mmalone's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional funny hopeful inspiring mysterious reflective sad tense fast-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

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theespressoedition's review against another edition

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challenging emotional tense slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

1.0

It really bums me out when I have to sit down and write yet another so-so or "negative" review for a book that seems so widely loved, but I can't say anything other than my true thoughts.

This book really hit me the wrong way. I would assume that the point of it was to bring about feelings of "just live your life and let people in because everything will eventually be alright," but that wasn't the overall effect for me. It felt as though the topic of suicide was very nonchalantly tossed about, without too much care.

Ove misses his wife and wants to see her again. He's displeased with quite literally everything in the world. So he makes the decision to end his life. Every single day there are detailed descriptions as to how he plans to do this and even how he follows through on some of the attempts. That's red flag number one for me.

Inadvertently, his new neighbors wind up preventing him from following through on his plans because of random, situational occurrences: needing help with a home project, needing to be driven to a hospital, etc. No one really seems to make mention of what he's doing, despite very obvious visuals of his plans on several occasions (like when his pregnant neighbor finds him actively suffocating himself in his car... and she doesn't actually say anything about it? Just ignores it??? Who does that?) Red flag number two was how it was only hijinks that keep Ove from committing suicide.

You're supposed to feel bad for the man or even relate to him, but instead, I felt irritated and at times, disgusted. He's rude, thoughtless, and selfish through and through. And yes, while the story takes him on a "journey" and he eventually becomes more loving towards those around him, it didn't feel like there was fantastic character development, so much as just a general acceptance of him as a curmudgeon from his neighbors and them as less than a problem from Ove. 

Suicide isn't comedy. It doesn't matter how it's sugar-coated. I could not find myself enjoying this book. There were moments of random sweetness, but that's about the extent of it. If anything, it put me in a really negative mind space, the more that I thought upon it. It makes me sad that I had this experience with it.
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